The Confederacy of Zila is a small, efficient nation, remarkable for its compulsory military service, frequent executions, and irreverence towards religion. The hard-nosed, hard-working, democratic population of 45 million Zilans are effectively ruled by a group of massive corporations, who run for political office and provide their well-off citizens with world-class goods and services. Their poorer citizens, however, are mostly starving to death while being urged to go out and get real jobs. The populace has reasonably extensive civil rights, although these are mostly aimed at allowing them to buy whatever they like.

The relatively small, pro-business government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Administration, and Education. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 9.6%.

The powerhouse Zilan economy, worth 3.46 trillion Byrds a year, is broadly diversified and led by the Information Technology industry, with major contributions from Arms Manufacturing, Furniture Restoration, and Basket Weaving. Average income is 76,858 Byrds, but there is a significant disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 235,190 per year while the poor average 19,453, a ratio of 12.1 to 1.

Teams of painters are converting road signs from horse lengths to kilometers, there is a growing belief that consciousness is a simulated illusion within a computer-generated reality, decades-serving politicians are now both out of touch and out of time, and adjacent suburbs build competing earthworks to force the other neighbourhood to flood first. Crime, especially youth-related, is almost non-existent, thanks to a capable police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Zila's national animal is the Raven, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to toxic air pollution.

Zila is ranked 146,608^th in the world and 366^th in Horizon for Largest Insurance Industry, scoring 1,089.3 on the Risk Expulsion Effectiveness Rating.